


Pretenses

by zhedang



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Era, Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-03
Updated: 2015-02-03
Packaged: 2018-03-06 16:07:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3140465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zhedang/pseuds/zhedang
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Levi and Eren feel each other out after the trial.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pretenses

**Author's Note:**

> This is a "missing scene" fic, which essentially means that it's a oneshot of something that could've happened off-screen in the series but got cut. This particular missing scene takes place between chapter 19 and 20 of the manga or episode 14 and 15 of the anime-- after the Eren's trial but before he travels with the Special Operations Squad to the old headquarters.
> 
> This is also a gift fic for spiffable. They wanted "Levi/Eren aftercare court scene" but when I sat down to write it I quickly realized that anything remotely close to actual aftercare would be OOC for Levi and Eren at that point in the series and it changed into something more character development-y. There's still a hint of aftercare to it, I think. A hint. Maybe. I tried. Mostly, this is just Eren trying to figure out what Levi's deal is (and vice versa.)

Commander Smith and Squad Leaders Hange and Zacharius left ahead of them and Eren was left alone with Captain Levi. They were all supposed to leave together, but Captain Levi had took one look at the carriage and declared, "You are not cramming all five of us in there, Erwin. Just Mike's legs need they own carriage, are you fucking kidding me?" which was a bit of an exaggeration (okay, a pretty big exaggeration; the carriage looked plenty roomy to Eren) but Commander Smith just nodded, unsurprised and unconcerned, and had another carriage called.

The next carriage arrived just a few minutes after the first one left. Eren wished it would've taken longer. He wanted to try to find Mikasa and Armin. They'd been whisked away by the Military Police after the trial, but Eren thought they had to still be nearby. He wanted to talk to them, see them, apologize to Mikasa for— for trying to kill her.

But they were already pulling away from the building.

Eren couldn't believe that he'd attacked Mikasa. But it'd been in the report and she'd confirmed it, so it must be true. He didn't understand how it could've happened. He wanted to ask her about it, get more details than what little he’d heard, but he wouldn't see either of them until it was time for them to join the Survey Corps. _If_ they joined.

If Captain Levi was at all worried about being stuck alone in a carriage with a human-Titan... thing, it didn't show. He was sitting across from him, one leg hooked over his knee as he read a file that Eren was pretty sure was his from training. Captain Levi hadn't spared Eren a glance since the carriage had started moving. Maybe he felt he didn’t have anything to be concerned about. He'd seem pretty confident that he could kill Eren if necessary, but maybe that was just a pretense. Like the beating. At least, he'd said the beating was an act. It sure hadn't felt like one when Captain Levi had his boot in his face.

To be honest, Eren was a little worried about being stuck alone in a carriage with Captain Levi.

Eren couldn't really be mad about it because he doubted he would've been handed over to the Survey Corps without that... display. Being studied and dissected by the Military Police sounded horrible—not to mention the promised execution to follow. Getting assigned to Captain Levi's supervision as a prisoner or an experiment (or whatever his current status was) wasn't exactly what he'd always pictured joining the Survey Corps would be like, but it was way better than being sliced apart and then thrown away. Even if it did cost him a tooth.

The tooth had grown back though. Eren prodded the spot in his mouth with his tongue. It felt only a little bit shorter than the other teeth in the area, so it seemed it was almost completely back to normal.

He was still examining the new tooth with his tongue when Captain Levi asked, "Is it done growing?"

Eren flushed with embarrassment, realizing that he'd been caught making a weird face by his superior office— and not just any superior officer, _strong as entire brigade Captain Levi_ — but he managed to answer normally. "Nearly done, sir."

"Let me know when it's done. The four-eyes wants data."

"Yes, Captain."

Captain Levi snorted, but Eren was pretty sure it was at something in the report he was reading and not at Eren's statement because he flipped the page over almost derisively. "The bruises on your face are gone," he noted.

Eren reached up and pressed his cheek with the heel of his hand. Sure enough, there was none of the stinging and tenderness from earlier. "Ah. I mean— yes, Captain."

Levi, apparently finished with the report for now, closed it neatly and set it aside him on the carriage bench with a stack of other files. He leaned forward, planting both feet onto the floor and Eren unconsciously scooted back a little, not realizing what he'd done until Levi raised an eyebrow. Eren tried to correct his position, but couldn't seem to strike the right balance between "respecting a superior officer's space" and "not looking like he was afraid of said superior officer." Levi watched him fidget and eventually it was the staring that made him stop.

"Did it hurt?" Captain Levi asked abruptly.

"S-sir?"

"You acted like it hurt," Captain Levi continued. "But your face looked like you were ready to tear something apart."

Eren's temper, so easy to spark, flared up because _of course it fucking hurt_ , but he managed to bank the flames, reminding himself just who he was about to spit vitriol at. Besides, once his head cleared a little, he remembered learning in training that most Titans didn't show any visible reaction to pain, as though most of them didn't feel it all, so Eren supposed it was a legitimate question.

"It hurt like nor— like usual, sir." He corrected himself because could he really be sure it hurt like "normal?" Maybe it would've hurt more for a regular person.

The answer seemed to satisfy Captain Levi— not that he looked satisfied, his brow was still as tight and furrowed as ever— because he didn't press further. He nodded, almost as though to himself, and announced, “I won’t hurt you without a good reason.”

The way he said it, Eren couldn’t tell if it was a promise or a simple statement of fact. Either way, Levi was looking at him with a narrow-eyed stare that made Eren want to start squirming all over again. It wasn't even an angry stare, it was just— just too much. Eren had seen Captain Levi passing through on horseback a number of times, eyes always focused on something in the distance and giving only the most cursory of attention to the crowds that gathered. He’d daydreamed before about riding out with Captain Levi, but he’d never imagined having that gaze fixed on himself. If he had, he sure wouldn’t have imagined it to be so unnerving, nor would he have thought to include the fluttering sensation currently filling his stomach. “I— I appreciate it, Captain.”

“Don’t fucking _thank_ me,” Captain Levi growled. Eren nearly apologized, but he figured that would probably only provoke him more. Captain Levi leaned back again, crossing his legs and taking up another file from the short stack he had beside him. “Did you mean it?”

Eren had no idea what he was asking about. Surely not Eren’s appreciation. “Mean what, sir?”

“‘Shut up and invest in me,’” Levi quoted, one eyebrow raised.

“Oh.” Eren had just been running his mouth in the courtroom, but every single word of it had been true, from the bottom of his heart. “Yes, sir.”

Captain Levi’s eyes had a weird, intense gleam in them. “Yes?”

“Yes,” Eren repeated, more firmly.

“Hm.” And that, apparently, was it. Captain Levi opened the next file and started reading it, the furrow in his brow sinking deeper and deeper. Eren sat in silence for a bit, staring out the crack of window that wasn’t covered and wondered how far they were headed. For all he knew, they could be headed for outer Rose or even whatever little territory had been regained in Maria. No one had told him anything about where they were going or why they were going there. He was being kept in the dark about everything—the upcoming expedition to decide his fate, the missing memories from Trost that nearly damned him—and much as he tried to just put his faith in whatever plans the Survey Corps had, it was… unsettling.

He eyed the stack of files beside Captain Levi and wondered if he even had the clearance for what he wanted to read. “Captain?”

He grunted in response, not looking up.

“Do you have a copy of the report on Trost? I’d like to—”

But before he could properly begin his explanation, the file was thrust out at him. Eren took it, warily eyeing all of the security stamps scattered across it. They’d only briefly touched on classified information denotations in training since they were all presumably a long ways out from becoming any sort of officer, but Eren was certain that he could be charged with treason for reading the contents of the file. “Is it really all right for me to see this, sir?”

“I say it is,” Captain Levi answered, still engrossed in whatever he was reading. Eren hesitated though, not making any movements to open the report, and Captain Levi snapped his file closed. “Read it. You turn into a fucking fifteen-foot Titan; you should know as much as possible about what you’re capable of. If anyone decides they’ve got a problem with that, I’ll deal with it.”

Eren nodded quickly, a little taken aback by Captain Levi’s vehemence, and paged through the report until he located Squad Leader Brzenska’s statement. He read through it three times, frowning and wondering if the events had really occurred as she described or if she’d missed something. Why would he attack Mikasa? He hadn’t attacked her the first time he’d become a Titan—or, at least, Mikasa sure hadn’t mentioned anything like that. He really needed to talk to Mikasa. Armin, too—what was all this about Armin stabbing him through the Titan?

He started reading the rest of the report, peeking up at Captain Levi every now and then. The captain’s attention was captured once again by the file in his hands, leaving Eren free reign to examine him. He was… smaller than Eren had thought and he’d never seen the Captain Levi from close enough to notice the plain exhaustion etched into his face. What surprised him the most though was how odd he acted. His manners and speech were coarse, even by Eren’s admittedly low standards, but he seemed… not concerned by, but at least attentive to Eren’s discomfort around him. Maybe he was trying to figure out how much he intimidated Eren, how much of a threat Eren actually was to him. Eren didn’t feel like he could possibly be any kind of threat to Captain Levi, but he never would’ve thought he’d ever attack Mikasa either.

Maybe Eren was thinking way too hard about all of this and Captain Levi was just weird. Squad Leaders Hange and Zacharius were pretty weird, so Captain Levi would fit right in. Eren had heard people deride the Survey Corps as the refuge of the strange, but he’d never seen any truth in the insult until today. And he, Eren, was probably the strangest of them all now.

Oh well. He was placed under Captain Levi’s supervision for the foreseeable future, so he’d have plenty of time to try to figure the captain out— what was real and what was an act. Eren only hoped that what Captain Levi had said about pain being the best way to teach lessons was part of the pretense too.  


End file.
